Showing results by author "James Lee Burke" in All Categories

Megan and Cisco Flynn are back in town. Nobody had ever been caught for the Klan murder of their father, Jack, and Detective Dave Robicheaux knows that trouble cannot be far behind. Particularly when the Flynns get mixed up with the case of a small-time hustler named Cool Breeze Broussard. As the Flynns find themselves deeper and deeper in trouble, Robicheaux is trying to keep Cool Breeze alive. Something ties Breeze to the Flynns, and all three of them to local plantation magnate Archer Terrebonne. Something long past is poisoning all their lives, bringing death in its wake.

House of the Rising Sun is an epic tale of love, loss, betrayal, vengeance and retribution that follows Texas Ranger Hackberry Holland on his journey to reunite with his estranged son, Ishmael. After a violent encounter that leaves four Mexican soldiers dead, Hackberry escapes the country in possession of a stolen artifact, earning the ire of a bloodthirsty Austrian arms dealer who will do anything to recapture his prize, believed to be the mythic cup of Christ.

Personal tragedy has left Dave Robicheaux close to the edge. Battling against his old addiction to alcohol and haunted nightly by vivid dreams and visitations, Dave finds his only tranquillity at home with his young ward Alafair. But even this fragile peace is shattered by the arrival of Dixie Lee Pugh who brings with him a brutal trail of murder and violence.

Dave Robicheaux still feels guilt over a tragic event he wasn't sober enough to prevent. Dallas Klein, a gambling addict and buddy, was killed in an armed robbery he'd been forced to engineer. Two decades later, several incidents in Dave's life in Iberia Parish link to those involved. First he meets Dallas' daughter, Trish, who keeps odd company and is blackballed by the local casinos. Then the supposed suicide of a young girl appears to be connected to the man Dallas owed money to.

This thunderous and introspective audiobook pits the earthy and robust Dave Robicheaux against forces of law and power far beyond his control. When a racially-motivated murder nearly three decades old churns back to the surface, Robicheaux is confronted by mob bosses, corrupt police chiefs and even dirtier politicians. Despite his efforts to stay clear of the action, he is inevitably drawn into the center of the conflict as evidence points to the current resident of the governor's mansion. Can Robicheaux uncover the truth and stay one step ahead of the people who want him silenced?

Sheriff Hackberry Holland patrols a small Southwest Texas border town with a deep and abiding respect for the citizens in his care. Still mourning the loss of his cherished wife and locked in a perilous almost-romance with his deputy, Pam Tibbs, a woman many decades his junior, Hackberry feeds off the deeds of evil men to keep his own demons at bay.

Lucas Smothers, nineteen and from the wrong end of town, has been arrested for the rape and murder of a local girl. His lawyer Billy Bob Holland is convinced of Lucas's innocence but proving it means unearthing the truth from a seething mass of deceit and corruption. A corruption endemic in the way it can be only in a gossipy small town where everybody knows everybody else's business. Billy Bob's relationship with Lucas's family is not an easy one—years back he was a close friend of Mrs Smothers, too close according to her husband Vernon.

Hurricane Katrina has transformed New Orleans into a violent wasteland. Criminals capitalise on the devastation as survivors wait for help that never comes. David Robicheaux - his city in ruins -- is tasked with investigating the murder of a pair of looters: is it a simple case of 'stand-your-ground', or something altogether darker? The dead men's accomplice holds the key but he has disappeared to escape the people hunting him. As Robicheaux uncovers a brutal catalogue of greed, torture and murder, his own family is threatened.

In 1934, 16-year-old Weldon Avery Holland confronts the notorious outlaws Bonnie and Clyde, resulting with Weldon firing a gun, unsure whether it hit its mark. Ten years later Second Lieutenant Weldon Holland barely survives the Battle of the Bulge, in the process saving the lives of Hershel Pine and a young prisoner of war, Rosita Lowenstein - a woman who holds the same romantic power over him as the beautiful Bonnie Parker.

A bullet shot through the window of Weldon Sonnier's house propels Dave Robicheaux back into the lives of a family he's not sure he wants to be reacquainted with ... Weldon Sonnier's CIA-influenced past has led to dangerous connections and commitments, including debts to local mob boss Joey 'Meatballs' Gouza. As Weldon puts himself in the line of fire, Lyle Sonnier, television evangelist and faith healer, reveals to Dave a violent family history that intersects menacingly with Dave's own.

In the fall of 1863, the Union Army is in control of the Mississippi River and much of Louisiana, including New Orleans and Baton Rouge. The retreating Confederate army is being replaced by Red Legs, irregulars commanded by a maniacal figure, and enslaved men and women are beginning to glimpse freedom. When Hannah Laveau, an enslaved woman working on the Lufkin plantation, is accused of murder, she goes on the run with Florence Milton, an abolitionist schoolteacher, dodging the local constable and the slavecatchers that prowl the bayous.

Hunting a sadistic killer who targets young prostitutes, Detective Dave Robicheaux has no mind to be sidetracked into persuading ex-schoolmate mobster Julie 'Baby Feet' Balboni to leave town. And it turns out that Balboni is the money behind a Civil War movie that's bringing in good business. But then the film crew stumble on a skeleton out in the bayou, and the links between a thirty-year-old lynching, a Civil War general, Balboni and the serial killer lead Dave into treacherous waters, with only a handful of unexpected allies to help him protect his own.

On its surface life in Houston is as you would expect: drive-in restaurants, souped-up cars, jukeboxes, teenagers discovering their sexuality. Against this backdrop Aaron Holland Broussard discovers the poignancy of first love and a world of violence he did not know existed. When Aaron spots the beautiful Valerie Epstein fighting with her boyfriend, he inadvertently challenges the power of the Mob. He also discovers he must find the courage his father had found as an American soldier in the Great War

Wyatt Dixon, rodeo cowboy and 'the most dangerous, depraved, twisted and unpredictable human I ever knew' is certainly not one of Billy Bob Holland's favourite people. Sentenced to 60 years in jail for murder, Dixon is out after only a year, due to the DA's failure to disclose a piece of information. He swears he's a changed man and needs Billy Bob's help, but how can Billy Bob believe the man who tortured his wife? And then there's Johnny American Horse, who has been caught carrying a gun. He says he needs it for protection; in a dream he saw two men coming for him.

Detective Dave Robicheaux is fighting his demons to overcome his toughest case yet. There's something off about the relationship between mob boss Tony Nemo, local author Levon Broussard and New Orleans poster boy Jimmy Nightengale, and after a vicious assault, it's up to Robicheaux to uncover the truth. Complicating matters is the sudden death of T. J. Dartez, the New Iberian local responsible for Robicheaux's wife's death, and all are looking to the detective as the murderer. Can Robicheaux clear his name?

For Dave Robicheaux, life in Louisiana is filled with haunting memories of the past - images from Vietnam, the violent streets of New Orleans, and his own troubled youth. In Crusader's Cross, a deathbed confession from an old schoolmate resurrects a story of injustice, the murder of a young woman, and a time in Robicheaux's life he has tried to forget. Her name may or may not have been Ida Durbin. It was back in the innocent days of the 1950s when Robicheaux and his brother, Jimmie, met heron a Galveston beach.

The American West in the early 1960s appears to be a pastoral paradise: golden wheat fields, mist-filled canyons, frolicking animals. Aspiring novelist Aaron Holland Broussard has observed it from the open door of a boxcar, riding the rails for both inspiration and odd jobs. Jumping off in Denver, he finds work on a farm and meets Joanne McDuffy, an articulate and fierce college student and gifted painter. Their soul connection is immediate, but their romance is complicated by Joanne's involvement with a shady professor who is mixed up with a drug-addled cult.

The call from ex-Klansman Aaron Crown couldn't have been more unexpected. Sentenced to forty years for the decades-old shooting of a civil rights activist, Crown should have been out of Iberia Parish, Louisiana, for good. Election candidate Buford LaRose wants Detective Dave Robicheaux to ignore Aaron's calls, promising Robicheaux a lucrative job when he makes governor. Worse still, Buford's wife, Karyn, seems unhealthily interested in getting very close to Robicheaux—just like old times. The LaRoses, each for their own reasons, want Crown's case buried.

Novelist Aaron Holland Broussard is shattered when his daughter Fannie Mae dies suddenly. As he tries to honour her memory by saving two young men from a life of crime amid their opioid-ravaged community, he is drawn into a network of villainy that includes a violent former Klansman, a far-from-holy minister, a biker club posing as evangelicals and a murderer who has been hiding in plain sight. Aaron's only ally is state police officer Ruby Spotted Horse, a no-nonsense woman who harbours some powerful secrets in her cellar.

Wilbur Pickett is a retired rodeo rider with big dreams. Dreams of a secure future for himself and his native American wife, a blind woman who sees more than a blind woman should thanks to her ancient heritage. When Wilbur happens upon a parcel of land with black gold waiting for the taking he also happens on Deitrich and a whole bunch of violent problems. Only lawyer Billy Bob Holland is prepared to stand up for Wilbur, to stand against the juggernaut that is Deitrich and his corrupting influence.